Despite attempts to brand TEA Partiers, the only thing that sticks is the truth.

The Boston Herald's Michael Graham covered the TEA Party in Boston yesterday and reports that the lefties are getting desperate. Even though Sarah Palin was the keynote speaker, it seems the classiness of the participants to stay focused on the reason for the event made them the real stars of the show.











Yolk’s on the lefties

By Michael Graham

Sarah Palin, star of the Boston Tea Party? Hardly.

And it wasn’t me or any of the other talk show types populating the stage on Boston Common, either.

No, it was the Tea Party crowd itself who stole the show. And not just with their numbers. They proved that the Tea Partiers are ready for prime time.

I’m not talking about the organization, though Holliston mom Christen Varley and her volunteers did an amazing job on a shoestring budget. Were there some technical glitches? Sure. But it didn’t throw the thousands of attendees off their game.

Nothing did. Not even flying eggs.

“I dodged the first one, but couldn’t get away from the second,” said Jack Lambert, a retired Navy vet from Natick. “It nailed me right on the chest.”

But Jack said no thanks when offered a paper towel. “I’m going to wear this badge with honor.”

How classy, how smart. For the rest of the day, the classlessness and anger of the Tea Party foes spoke for itself from his jacket.

Not that the handful of lefty nuts needed any help. Their ignorance was on full display in their vile signs, signs that had they not been about Palin, would have been denounced as sexist by these same Cambridge libs. But instead of inspiring anger among the Tea Partiers, the counter-protests inspired good humor and sincere interest. Attendees reported that attempting to debate with the protesters was a waste because they knew so little about Obamacare, the stimulus, the debt or any of the issues motivating the Tea Partiers.

So why were they there? Ironically, they appeared to be drawn by Palin’s celebrity. “They were the kind of people who think Palin really said she could see Russia from her house,” one caller told me.

Then again, given that The Boston Globe-Democrat made that same suggestion on its front page. . .

No matter. The Tea Partiers knew why they were there. Their signs were about government power, individual freedom and fiscal sanity. You’d have to be illiterate to leave Wednesday’s rally still asking the media’s favorite question: “Why are the Tea Partiers really angry?” Which means that unless you work for MSNBC, you should know what’s up.

My two favorite signs? I loved the Tea Partiers’ embrace of inept mockery in: “I can see November from my house.” (They can.)

The Boston Herald

Democrats Have Increased Taxes by $670 Billion and Counting…

List Includes 14 Tax Hikes Totaling Over $316 Billion on Middle Class Families.

Since January of 2009, President Obama and Congressional Democrats have enacted into law gross tax increases totaling more than $670 billion, or more than $2,100 for every man, woman and child in the United States. The list of tax increases includes at least 14 violations of the President’s pledge not to raise taxes on Americans earning less than $200,000 for singles and $250,000 for married couples.



TAX INCREASES ENACTED

•New tax on individuals who do not purchase government approved health insurance

•New tax on employers who fail to fully comply with government health insurance mandates*

•New 40% excise tax on certain high cost health plans *

•New ban on the purchase of over the counter drugs using funds from FSAs, HSAs and HRAs*

•Increase the Medicare tax on wages and self employment income by 0.9% and impose a new 3.8% surtax on certain investment income (for individuals over $200,000 and couples over $250,000)

•Increase, from 7.5% to 10% of income, the threshold after which individuals can deduct out of pocket medical expenses*

•Impose a new $2,500 annual cap on FSA contributions *

•New annual tax on health insurance *

•New annual tax on brand name pharmaceuticals *

•New 2.3% excise tax on certain medical devices *

•New 10% tax on indoor UV tanning services *

•New tax on insured and self insured health plans *

•Double the penalty for non qualified HSA distributions *

•Eliminate the deduction for expenses allocable to Medicare Part D subsidy

•Limit the deduction for compensation to officers, employees and directors of certain health insurance providers

•Require information reporting on payments to corporations

•Impose additional requirements for section 501(c)(3) hospitals

•Make “black liquor” ineligible for cellulosic biofuel producer credit

•Codify economic substance doctrine and impose penalties for underpayments

•Tobacco tax increase and expanded enforcement authority*

•Repeal guidance allowing certain taxpayers to claim losses of an acquired corporation

•Federal Unemployment surtaxes extended through June 2011 *

•Delay of rules to reduce the double taxation of worldwide American employers until 2018 (worldwide interest allocation)

•Delay of rules to reduce the double taxation of worldwide American employers until 2021 (worldwide interest allocation)

TOTAL = $670.341 BILLION AND COUNTING…

*VIOLATES PRESIDENT’S PLEDGE TO NOT INCREASE TAXES ON MIDDLE CLASS

Click here to see a breakdown of the numbers from the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee

Now it's the established Repubs who want to be like Ron Paul

Brad Jackson of the New Ledger responds as if the latest Rasmussen Poll showing Texas Congressman Ron Paul would give President Obama a run for his money in a general election is a surprise. A quick look at Paul's history both as a Congressman and a Presidential candidate show he was TEA Party when TEA Party wasn't cool.

Paul already had a band of unlikely allies in his run for the Presidency in 2008 that included Conservatice Republicans, disenchanted Democrats and Libertarians who just want to be left the hell alone. Those three groups are what now make up the core of the TEA Party movement.

Jackson's referral to Paul as looney doesn't seem to take into account that the "ole' bird" has led the fight for some pretty popular TEA Party type legislation in the Fed Audit Bill, or ideas of smaller government, less intrusion in our lives, better monetary policy, and bringing an end to world interventionism. He doesn't seem to take into account that it is the Republicans that have moved toward Paul's message, a message that has been far more consistent for not just years, but decades.

Ron Paul and Obama Neck and Neck in Rasmussen Poll

by Brad Jackson

No, this is not a joke. A new Rasmussen poll shows that in a race between Barack Obama and perennial GOP presidential hopeful Ron Paul, that the nutty Texas Congressman would come within one point of the current President. According to Rasmussen, “42% of likely voters would vote for Obama and 41% would vote for Paul. This, despite the fact that Paul gets lower support from Republicans (66%) than Obama does from Democrats (79%).”

That’s right, Obama and RON PAUL would be practically tied. Now of course, Ron Paul will not be the GOP nominee, but this has to look bad if your in Camp Obama and surveying 2012. If you’re neck and neck with the local looney, God knows how you’ll fair against a serious contender.

Rasmussen also says that within the Political Class, the Paul/Obama matchup would be a blowout. While 58% of Mainstream voters favor Paul, 95% of the Political Class vote for Obama. However, it is that very "Political Class" that is on the outs with mainstream voters, and why Republicans are on the outside trying to fight their way into the TEA Party movement.

Mainstream voters numbers have grown, and they have grown weary of the pendulum. Memories of George W. Bush's spendthrift bailouts are still fresh. So, it is Republicans trying to convince the TEA Party movers and shakers that they are, well . . . more like Paul.

Warnock tells WLBT he embraces audit, but will there be a full investigation?

Rudy Warnock has told WLBT that he welcomes an audit of his engineering firms dealings with Madison County. But if, as Warnock says, all the subcontracts through the county have been approved, then is it likely the smoking gun exists elsewhere? If there are subcontracts outside of the scope of the Board of Supervisors approval, then will the investigation go further beyond the Madison County Courthouse to find them?

Of course Warnock can be welcoming. He already knows what they're going to find in Madison County's records. As has always been the case, the question isn't whether there were approved subcontracts. The question is whether there are UNapproved subcontracts.

A Madison County engineer said he welcomes an audit of his engineering firm by the state auditor's office.

After an independent audit was done on Rudy Warnock by a group of residents, Madison's mayor wanted to take a closer look at fees he charged her city.

That audit was done by engineer Richard McAfee of Florida.

In his report he claimed to have found multiple instances of excessive charges to the City of Madison and questionable payments to the Warnock and Associates Engineering Firm.

After examining the report, Mayor Mary Hawkins-Butler said she believes Warnock sub-contracted much of the work out for a lower fee.

She also accuses Warnock of redesigning road projects simply to increase his profit.

In a press release Tuesday, Warnock stated "I have done absolutely nothing wrong and I embrace this examination by the state auditor."

Warnock went on to say he is looking forward to the results and will be waiting by the phone for the mayor's apology when it is over.

It's not like there isn't already proof of the willingness to skirt the rules of Open Meetings Law as the Madison County Journal reported in October 2009.

the Mississippi Ethics Commission hearing officer found that Northern District Transportation Commissioner Bill Minor and Southern District Transportation Commissioner Wayne Brown did "knowingly and willfully" violate the Open Meetings Act when they met with District 2 Supervisor Tim Johnson and County Engineer Rudy Warnock at Nick's Restaurant on Aug. 10.

MC Journal: Secretary of State's order shuts charity, fines director $25K

The Secretary of State's office ordered a Ridgeland-based charity to close Wednesday and issued $50,000 in fines against the organization and its executive director.

Fine Arts Institute of Mississippi, or FAIM, was ordered to close Wednesday after Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann issued a final order in an ongoing investigation into alleged fraud.

Madison County Journal

Despite declining support, Steele keeps digging the hole.

Peter Flaherty of the conservative National Legal And Policy Center relays a conversation with Angela Sailor, the Republican National Committee's director of coalitions:

RNC Chair Steele Refuses to Cancel Speech at Sharpton Event

"Angela Sailor, the Republican National Committee’s Director of Coalitions, called me today to inform me that Michael Steele will speak as scheduled at the annual conference of Al Sharpton’s group, the National Action Network (NAN). On April 4, NLPC asked Steele to withdraw from the event, which takes place tomorrow through Friday in New York City. When I went through each of our objections, Ms. Sailor gave me some permutation of the following: 'Chairman Steele is going to New York to speak to 500-1,000 people in a ballroom to ask them to support Republican candidates.' When I asked if Steele might have better luck elsewhere, she claimed that many of the attendees are 'independent,' who she characterized as 'swing voters'. When I queried whether most attendees, who are paying for travel and New York hotel rooms, were more likely activists committed to Sharpton’s message, Sailor stuck to the script. She responded: 'If we take time to talk to folks in a ballroom, they will support our candidates if we go and ask them.'"

On Feb. 26, 2009, the 41-year-old Sailor was named director of the RNC’s coalitions department, an office charged with evaluating “every outside constituent organization in the country at the local, state and national levels.” The department is integral to fulfilling Steele’s goal to reach out to minority voting groups on a full-time basis, not just during election season. It also strives to connect to young voters through social media, and trains grassroots activists about using new media to advance the GOP's agenda.

To show he meant business, Steele made the coalitions group an independent departmentwithin the RNC, complete with its own budget and a handsome salary for Sailor.

Is this starting to sound like a Chairman playing loose and goosey with RNC money? It should, because he is.

McMillen is milking it for all it's worth

NMissCommentor: Constance McMillen to be a Grand Marshal for 41st Annual LGBT Pride March, NYC

Scholarship offers, calls from Hollywood celebrities, my how skewed this whole affair has become. The poor girl probably thinks this will be what the rest of her life will be like.

$3M federal grant to help center for river power

A $3 million federal economic stimulus grant will be used to establish a center for commercial development for turbines that can be placed in the Mississippi River and other powerful rivers to generate electricity.

Officials with Tulane University, which is guiding the River Sphere project, said the center could mark a big step forward in the science of hydrokinetics - using flowing water without a dam for generating electricity.

Calling the river one of Louisiana's best potential assets in alternative forms of power, Douglas Meffert, executive director of the project, said hydrokinetic power "is the sleeping giant of energy."

Using the river to generate power is well beyond the thinking stage.

Several companies have received preliminary permits from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to place turbines in the Mississippi and other rivers that would be turned by flowing water. Several different technologies are emerging to do that, such as totally underwater generation and turbines connected to barges on the surface that would do the generation.

Plans call for the turbines to be mounted on pylons below shipping lanes and attached to bridge abutments.

Forbes

Barbour to reveal his new Miss. budget blueprint

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour holds a news conference Wednesday to reveal his new recommendations for the state budget.

His announcement comes six days before legislators return to Jackson to finish writing a $5.5 billion state spending plan for the fiscal year that begins July 1.

Barbour released his initial budget in November, but lawmakers have rejected some of his ideas, including his proposal to merge the eight public universities into five.

Barbour spokesman Dan Turner says the Republican governor still wants lawmakers to be careful with the state's financial reserves and to give agency directors more flexibility in their individual budgets.

It's not clear how long it will take lawmakers to finish their budget talks.

Next on Obama's hit list: small contractors

On April 22 (Earth Day!) new EPA regulations go into effect that could take down many a small contractor.

It’s all about the rules on lead paint removal, which heretofore had been enforced only for work on homes that were old enough to have lead paint and in which small children or pregnant women (the populations at risk) resided. But that’s not good enough for our nanny state; oh no. Now the rules will apply to work done on any home built before 1978, eliminating the previous sensible escape hatch whereby a homeowner could opt out of the regulations if there were no at-risk individuals living in the house.

You might ask why it is that a homeowner contemplating a remodeling job should be deprived of the ability to refuse to pay for costly lead protection procedures that are not needed. Well, here’s your answer: “this option (the opt-out) was ripe for abuse.” In other words, the government can’t trust people to do what’s in the best interest of their own children or pregnancies, and so we all must suffer.

And suffer we will, especially the contractors. To be in compliance by April 22 would mean that every contractor contemplating a job that would disturb more than six square feet of a home’s area (and this includes not just carpentry but plumbing, window installation, and heating and AC installation) would need to have completed a one-day course in the matter, necessitating taking a day off and spending about two hundred dollars. But since there are nowhere near enough certified teachers, therefore the vast majority of America’s contractors could not possibly comply by April 22 even if they wanted to.

But that’s relatively minor compared to larger problems connected with the new rules, such as the fact that they will increase the costs of renovation for both contractor and homeowner just at a time when the industry and the consumer can least handle it.

Obamacare backlash sends Democrats to the foxholes

There was no health care bounce. In fact, there has been something of a health care swoon.

Democrats have seen the favorable rating of their party drop to the lowest level ever recorded by Gallup — 41 percent — and the president’s job approval rating remains below 50 percent.

Now, as Congress returns to work after a two-week Easter break, the choice before the majority party is this: keep plunging ahead or start running for cover?

President Obama is brimming with transformational ideas. Aside from ratifying a controversial nuclear treaty and confirming a new liberal Supreme Court justice, Obama wants new rules on bank bailouts, immigration reform and global warming legislation.

But Democrats are feeling skittish after being back among their constituents.

Rep. Bart Stupak gave up his bid for a 10th term as tea partiers swarmed his Michigan district. Stupak’s retreat on his abortion concerns in the president’s health plan allowed the bill to become law. His flip-flop also seems to have undone his career.

His fellow Democrats were mostly mum about health care during the spring break.

When they did speak publicly, it was about bringing home the appropriations bacon or their efforts to create jobs.

The Washington Examiner

Jindal Staffer and boyfriend severely beaten following dinner attended by Governor Barbour and Texas Governor Rick Perry

Couple reportedly targeted for wearing Sarah Palin pins. Media silent for three days over Friday night incident.

Republican Party of Louisiana Chairman Roger F. Villere, Jr. hosted an event Friday night which brought together Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, Texas Governor Rick Perry and Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour at Brennans Restaurant in New Orleans. The event, in New Orleans, was seen as a highlight of a successful weekend in which Villere and Louisiana Republicans brought in national and regional Republican colleagues to discuss a wide range of Party and political issues at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference.

The weekends festivities were targeted by protesters all over the city, and at least one left-leaning blog publicized the fundraising dinner writing:

These **sholes are the ones who will drop $10K for a dinner with Piyush Jindal, the worm of a Guv’nor for the Gret Stet of Looziana, but never think of what $10K might mean to to a food bank here.

The Times Picayune reported the incident:

Gov. Bobby Jindal’s chief campaign fund-raiser is recovering from injuries she suffered in a Friday night altercation with a group of people in the French Quarter, the governor’s office said Monday.


Allee Bautsch suffered a broken leg and her boyfriend suffered a concussion and a fractured nose and jaw in the incident, which happened after a fundraising event at Brennan’s Restaurant on behalf of the Louisiana Republican Party on Friday evening.

According to Right Pundits:

There were protesters in the area at the time of the altercation, however, Jindal’s office refuses to speculate as to whether or not the attack was perpetrated by the democratic protesters. There is also no information being put out there as to what the protesters were protesting. Some are speculating that the assault happened after a heated argument about Sarah Palin.

Sadly, the extent of injuries suffered by both Allee Bautsch and her boyfriend, Joe Brown, make it obvious that it was more than an exchange of cross words that lead to some shoving. Bobby Jindal’s campaign finance director attacked in the French Quarter following a campaign fund-raising event and being left with such severe injuries has the appearance of an assault by people who might have some familiarity with inflicting bodily harm on others.

According to Louisiana political blog The Hayride:

Two people at the Brennan’s event have now confirmed that the protest had largely broken up by the time it ended, but we also understand from someone who visited Allee Bautsch in the hospital Saturday morning that she and Brown were followed and attacked expressly because they had Palin pins on (she heard one of the attackers say “Let’s get them, they have Palin pins on”) – so the attack WAS politically motivated as its victims understood it. It was not a mugging, it was not an argument gone wrong and it was not a bar fight.

Rationing of Care by the Government happens every day

Part of the argument against the government takeover of health care for Americans has been that it would result in rationing of care. Proponents dismissed these claims as scare tactics. But, the simple truth is the Federal Government already runs a portion of health care through Medicare and Medicaid. Those programs provide an example of what we can expect from the system.
Health Care supporters are quick to use the same argument when they are demonizing the "evil" insurance companies that "profit from the misery of the American people." But, the AMA, that group of doctors who supported the President's efforts and showed up with their white coats to the White House, has a report that shows the demonization is a smoke screen.

Will the new Health Care Entitlement result in more denied care? The record indicates that the answer to that question is a resounding yes.

In 2008, Medicare led the pack of AMA's own National Health Insurer Report Card as the most frequent denier of coverage. Of the eight insurers listed on that report, Medicare was the most likely to reject a claim, sending away 6.85% of requests. This was more than any private insurer and double that of the private insurers’ average.

The results for 2009 were only slightly better for Medicare beneficiaries. Last year Medicare was no longer the most frequent denier. However the agency was still double the denials of the head of the pack, Aetna. Aetna decreased the number of denials by 5 percent in a year, a full percentage point more than Medicare's current rate of 4 percent.

Could it be that commercial health insurers have more efficient claims processing centers? Could it be that the private sector is just more all around efficient?

In the case of health insurance claims, firms make more money when they deny more claims, right? Those evil money hungry creeps! So how is the profit motive leading to more private-sector claims approvals?

The truth is competition between insurers INCREASE claims approvals. Most physicians and hospitals must take Medicare because it represents so large a share of the healthcare spending. On the other hand, physicians may decide to only accept patients whose insurance companies have prompt payment with fewer denials. This leads to some incentive for insurance companies to DECREASE claims denials. The way to INCREASE access and DECREASE health care problems is to INCREASE competition.

Get it? Yeah? Well, your leaders in Washington, don't.

It is important to point out that the differential claims denial rates also has a lot to do with the demographics of Medicare and commercial insurance enrollees. Almost all Medicare enrollees are over 65, while commercial insurers have enrollees who are of varying ages. Since older individuals are more likely to demand high cost medical procedures, if high cost medical procedures are the ones that are more likely to be denied then Medicare’s higher denial rate may simply be due, in part, to the composition of its enrollees.

Whatever the reason, the fact that Medicare denies more claims than commercial insurers should dispel the myth that the government is simply a benevolent entity, while commercial insurers are ruthless, profit-hungry wolves.

And then there's the absolute ineptitude that comes from federal rules and government agencies as witnessed just recently by a California Medicaid benificiary; a woman with cancer.

Mom With Cancer Gets Insurance Help For Transplant


A Hollywood woman who was dropped from Medicaid coverage while needing a bone marrow transplant is finally getting the coverage and treatment she needs to stay alive.

Diana Smith is battling a rare form of Leukemia and needs the transplant to survive. She managed to raise money to pay for it thanks to her friends and the community, but then last week she found out her Medicaid coverage was dropped – putting her operation on hold.

Smith had gone through six months of radiation and chemotherapy -- one week out of every month. She is in remission and had a donor for a transplant; being in remission is a prerequisite for the transplant.

But her hopes of receiving the transplant were dashed in March, when she says, the Social Security Administration contacted her –without her soliciting it -- and told her that her three year-old son was entitled to receive Social Security disability payments. Even though she didn't ask for it, she signed the form and received her son's first check.

In April, Medicaid canceled her universal health care policy because her income level had risen with her son's payments – making her ineligible for the insurance program.

The problem is Jackson Memorial Hospital could not provide the procedure because the risk is too high. The universal policy from Medicaid helps shield the hospital from liability in this kind of case. Without it, they are subject to liability issues.

Even though Smith offered to cancel her son's disability benefits, she was told it's too late.

CBS 4

Of course, following the report local state officials, and the hospital jumped in to help see that the woman received the surgery. But, should you have to call the television reporter, or a Congressman everytime one of the newly hired Health Care bureacrats decides you and your doctor have it all wrong?

State Auditor's office sends a response team to Madison County to look at Warnock and Associates Contracts

The Flora Harvester has been informed that State Auditor Stacey Pickering's office has dispatched a team of 6 auditors as part of the offices Audit Response Team to Madison County today. The team is reportedly looking into contracts the county has with Warnock and Associates Engineering.

Warnock has been under fire from elected officials Madison Mayor Mary Hawkins-Butler and Supervisor D.I. Smith, as well as a chorus of county residents turned activists. All have been calling for an audit from the state to uncover what they believe to be a fiscally irresponsible arrangement between Warnock and three of the five Supervisors. Efforts to release subcontracts Warnock says were approved by the Board of Supervisors have met with stiff resistance from Supervisor's Tim Johnson, Karl Banks and Paul Griffin, while being supported by Supervisor's John Bell Crosby and the aforementioned Smith.

In a point by point rebuttal to Mayor Hawkins-Butler's commissioned review of engineering fees and practice, and published on Jackson Jambalya, Warnock denied any wrongdoing stating, "all subcontracts is furnished to the Madison County Board of Supervisors, which votes on them in open board meetings."

Warnock's attorney Dorsey Carson supplied the rebuttal with 31 pages of other documents to the local blogger, but only once touched on the issue of subcontracts. No subcontracts were actually produced or shared by Warnock.

The Flora Harvester has also received information from an informant close to the engineering firm that Warnock, fresh off a recent trip to the Bahamas, was recently heard discussing a planned trip to Paris at an event to celebrate the opening of Calhoun Station Parkway. Records show that Warnock's firm charged the county $150,000 for environmental engineering fees for Calhoun Station Parkway Phase II and $176,800 for Calhoun Station Parkway Phase III.

Related Posts: Madison County Supervisor Asks For Audit Of Engineering Fees . . . Again.
"To Audit Or Not to Audit?" That is the question
Madison County Journal--Report questions engineering fees.
WLBT Report--Madison Mayor questions county engineering fees

Ole Miss investiture services shows universities new leader is ready for the school to become the state's premier "LIBERAL" arts college.

Although I was not in attendance, the word is that Dan Jones official investiture service and the events surrounding it were very left leaning in tone. That lean included a speech by Jones that returned to diversity time and again, and a need to expand new efforts (read programs) to help poor and underpriviledged attend Ole Miss. I thought we already had that in the Pell Grant program. One that, incidentally, was just recently expanded upon by government legislation that took over the entire student loan system and signed by President Obama. If a person wants a quality education, the resources are there to get it.

Reportedly the speech was filled with references to more open borders, and addressing "disparities." That wonderful of code words that really means redistribution. Don't tell me about the "have's" and "have nots" without attempting to address the "work's" and "work not's", the "try's" and "try not's", and the "do's" and the "do not's." There should be diversity in the workplace. But, the first requirement is that a person be qualified to do the job, and actually want to work.

The private prayer service at Paris-Yates Chapel was also reportedly a "diverse" event, allowing for a Muslim chant in edition to Christian prayers. My, how far we have come . . . or fallen?

I do not care today, tomorrow or ever to be so all inclusive that we forget the Muslim Religion is based on the Koran that teaches those who do not agree with it must die. Period.


From NEMS 360:

OXFORD - Dan Jones quoted Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. He spoke about his own experiences in China, Russia and Iran. And he acknowledged the presence of the North Korean ambassador to the United Nations, who was among the many guests at Friday's ceremony.

As Jones stood at the lectern in the Gertrude C. Ford Center at his investiture as the University of Mississippi's 16th Chancellor in 162 years, he spoke about a vision that reached far beyond Oxford.

"We are a public university in Mississippi and we need to focus on the needs around us, but we also need to focus on what the needs of our world are," Jones said after delivering his speech.

Reflecting the state of the current economy, the ceremony was restrained in pomp. While Jones spoke on stage, all the lights in the building were dimmed and a single spotlight shone on the university's new leader. A bouquet of flowers sat on the floor in front of him.

"We should be less concerned about the general state of the economy than about the growing disparity between those who have and those who have not," Jones said during his speech.

"And I need not remind this audience that to see some of the starkest examples of these disparities, we need only look at our own doorstep."

Among the guests at the ceremony were U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker, U.S. Rep. Travis Childers, former Govs. William Winter and Ronnie Musgrove, current Gov. Haley Barbour and the university's previous chancellor, Robert Khayat.

Initially, it will be small townsfolk who will be "going Postal"

The Postal Service needs to make serious cuts. This will be tough on the elderly and poor in rural Mississippi who aren't educated in all this "new fangled" computer business. But, with a reported $7 billion loss in the fiscal year that ends in September and the potential loss of at least $238 billion in the next decade if Congress fails to act, people will just have to deal with not having service on Saturday. And, if their Post Office closes, they may just have to deal with that to.

We'll all get a lesson in the hypocrisy of small town America as this argument continues. Because, it will be everyone elses Post Office that needs to close to save money. Get ready to hear the statement, "I believe in reducing government spending, BUT . . ."

From the Washington Post:



GAO: Postal Service business 'not viable'

The U.S. Postal Service's current business model "is not viable" and the mail agency should make deeper job and wage cuts, hire more part-time staff and consider outsourcing operations, according to a draft of a government audit acquired by The Federal Eye.

Auditors also urge Congress to remove restrictions on the Postal Service's ability to cut Saturday mail delivery and close post offices, according to the report, which offers recommendations similar to the USPS's own proposed 10-year business plan.

Lawmakers requested the Government Accountability Office report, set for a Monday release, as they prepare to consider the USPS plan, which was introduced last month. The proposals call for an end to six-day delivery and ask Congress to give the mail agency the ability to raise prices beyond the rate of inflation and close post offices if necessary.

Obama will move quickly to fill Supreme Court seat

Several names have already been floated as possible contenders for Stevens’ seat. Topping the list are Solicitor General Elena Kagan and federal appellate judges Diane Wood and Merrick Garland.


Obama said he will pick a nominee with qualities similar to Stevens: someone with “an independent mind, a record of excellence and integrity, a fierce dedication to the rule of the law, and a keen understanding of how the law affects the daily lives of the American people.”

In addition, the president said his pick will understand that “powerful interests must not be allowed to drown out the voices of ordinary citizens.”

Roll Call

Stossel: More Pointless Government Work

By: JOHN STOSSEL
The pressure is on Washington to spend that $862 billion in stimulus funds. Uncle Sam has doled out only $300 billion so far, so now they want to waste more of your money to expand a sleepy customs border station in Forest City, Maine; year-round population: Five.

The current station is sizable, with radiation detectors and a private residence for customs agents. Although only 5 cars cross the border on an average day, the Feds want to build additional residences, even though no one lives in the current one. They also want to add parking, but these ambitious plans call for more land than the government owns.

Jane Johnson is one of Forest City's 5 residents. Johnson says the government wants to take half of her property. The parking lot would be within 12 feet of her home.

Dale Wheaton owns Wheaton's Lodge, a fishing camp. Wheaton's land is also under scrutiny. Like Johnson, Wheaton refuses to allow government surveyors onto his property. But he is realistic about his chances against the government.

"I learned in primary school not to pick on people that are bigger than you because they usually beat the living crap out of you. And they’re gonna beat the crap out of me too."

The customs station is only open from 8 am to 4 pm and it’s closed Sundays. Johnson says that even if it did need expansion…

"That’s not going to stop any terrorists from coming into this country. They can come across the lake, they can come through the woods, they can come across the stream."

But that Recovery Act stimulus money must be spent. Homeland Security tells us that the expansion will address a “critical national security need.” But none of the five folks in Forest City believe that. Bob Parker told us:

"Somebody in Washington has decided we need to spend this stimulus money by Sept 30. Let’s go spend some of it in Forest City, Maine."

Supreme Court Justice Stevens announces retirement at end of current session

Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens is going to retire when the court wraps up its work for the summer break.

Stevens, who marks his 90th birthday this month, had said in an interview published less than a week ago that he would "surely" retire while Barack Obama was still in the White House.

"I can tell you that I love the job and deciding whether to leave it is a very difficult decision," Stevens told the Washington Post. "But I want to make it in a way that's best for the court."

The Hill

Looks like Stupak's healthcare dealings have sent him packing.

The public doesn't like a public official to cave on his principles, and Bart Stupak is now a shining example of how the public will hear none of it. If your Pro Life then be Pro Life. The public has had its fill of the gamesmanship in DC.

The Hill is reporting:

Rep. Bart Stupak to retire after last-second deal on healthcare

Rep. Bart Stupak is expected to announce his retirement Friday, weeks after his critical role in healthcare's passage.

Stupak, the centrist Michigan Democrat who crafted a last-second deal on abortion that allowed President Barack Obama's healthcare bill to pass the house and become law, will say during a press conference this morning that he won't pursue reelection this fall.

Stupak has been wrestling with whether to retire for weeks, and the brutal healthcare fight certainly played a role in his decision.

Stupak told The Hill that fighting the healthcare bill had been "a living hell" a little more than a week before the bill was approved by the House.

Telephone lines to his office were jammed, and he and his wife received nasty calls at home.

“All the phones are unplugged at our house — tired of the obscene calls and threats. She won’t watch TV,” Stupak said during the interview. “People saying they’re going to spit on you and all this. That’s just not fun.”

Things didn't get easier for Stupak after he reached a deal with Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and other Democrats that allowed his group of anti-abortion rights centrist Democrats to vote for the healthcare bill.

The Hill

Related: Want to be a Congressman? Stupak and others targeted and threatened. (Listen)
Conservative Voters to Democrats: "We're Coming and Hell is Coming With Us!"

Louisville/Winston County airport awarded improvement grant funds

The Louisville/Winston County airport will receive $112,812 in federal grant funds for improvements at the airport according to Third District Congressman Gregg Harper's office.

The improvements for the airport will include airport terminal expansion and airstrip restripping work which is set to begin in the next few weeks according to Dell Coward of Engineering and Surveyors of Noxapater who will be doing the work. . The funds for the improvements will be from Federal Aviation Agency funds, state funds, city funds and county funds. The FAA will pay for 95 percent of the project with the state paying 2.5 percent and the city and county splitting the remaining 2.5 percent.

According to records, the field averages about 17 aircraft flights a week with 6 airplanes based at the airport.

The Winston County Journal

Suit filed on Medicaid cuts

Nursing homes want reserve funds used

The Mississippi Health Care Association, the Independent Nursing Home Association and dozens of nursing homes from across the state filed a lawsuit Thursday seeking to stop the Mississippi Division of Medicaid from making a planned $14 million cut in payments to providers.

The lawsuit filed in Hinds County Chancery Court late Thursday afternoon argues that state reserve funds can be used to shore up the Medicaid budget and the cuts are unnecessary.

The suit seeks an injunction to stop the cuts over the uncertainty of "adequate funding" for providers.

The Mississippi Pharmacists Association and the Mississippi Independent Pharmacies Association joined the lawsuit.

The cuts are pending federal permission.

Dan Turner, spokesman for Gov. Haley Barbour, said the governor's office had not reviewed the lawsuit and did not have a comment.

The Clarion Ledger

With nothing left to say Dems cry, "Racism!"

This is an interesting article on Democrats use of race over the years. Today's Democrat Party is not necessarily the party of of its forefathers in a lot of ways, same goes for Republicans. But, one thing is true for certain Dems today are just as quick to label someone an agitator as they were in Wallace's day. While the line this article draws through history makes it worth a read, there is a 900 pound gorilla in the room when it comes to the future of the same racial agitation and claims of bigotry. That future is one that will no doubt see attempts by Democrats to push, wheel and deal for amnesty for illegal aliens.

HARTWELL: Democrats reek of George Wallace Tea-bagger epithet just the latest example of liberals' hate hypocrisy

Charges of intolerance are leveled routinely at those who question the administration's policies. To listen to the accusers, one would think the entire history of racial discrimination and discord in this nation were properly laid at the feet of Republicans. History teaches otherwise.

I grew up in the Deep South, a John F. Kennedy Democrat. My parents taught me that, as Martin Luther King would say later, people should be equal before the law, judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin. Of course, that was not the prevailing view at the time, when racial discrimination led to separate schools, theater seating and water fountains.

The shameful politics of racial division were practiced skillfully by the demagogues of the day. They were all Democrats. If you're of a certain age, you'll remember, among others: Georgia's Lester Maddox, of ax-handle fame; George Wallace of Alabama, who stood in the schoolhouse door; Harry Byrd of "massive resistance" Virginia; and the everlasting Sen. Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, who, along with Sen. Al Gore Sr. of Tennessee and other Democrats, filibustered against the Civil Rights Act of 1964 for 57 days.

It was the Democratic Party that conceived, implemented and perpetuated the pernicious system of racial discrim- ination and preference that arose early in the last century and finally crumbled in the 1960s. They did this in order to sustain their own power. It worked for them, but not for the people. The Jim Crow system not only was morally reprehensible and responsible for much injustice over many years, but also clearly retarded economic growth. This hurt whites and blacks alike for decades.

As of 1963, the Republican Party had a long record of support for civil rights legislation - not so the Democrats. Republican support for the major civil rights legislation enacted during the presidency of Lyndon B. Johnson was stronger than that of the Democrats.

More than three times as many Democratic senators (21) as Republicans (6) voted against the Civil Rights Act in 1964; in the House, the "no" votes came from 96 Democrats and 34 Republicans. In both chambers, greater percentages of Republicans than Democrats supported both bills, by significant margins. For example, 82 percent of Senate Republicans voted for the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as opposed to 69 percent of Democrats; for the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 97 percent of Republican senators voted yes, versus 74 percent of the Democrats.

There was a time when majorities in both parties (even if narrower among Democrats) endorsed the equal treatment of all Americans, without regard to race. Public opinion shifted heavily and quickly in the same direction, perhaps because the moral and rational case was compelling. As sociologist John Shelton Reed wrote, "During the three years 1963 to 1966, support for de jure segregation became a minority view among white Southerners. The percentage of white Southern parents who completely opposed public school desegregation, for example, dropped from 61 to 24." That was a dramatic shift in a short time. It was permanent, too, the death rattle of Jim Crow.

Sadly, however, the ascendancy of "colorblind" politics in the Democratic Party was fleeting. The Democrats were the masters of racial patronage; with hardly a hiccup, they took the game to another level. Where once they played on the fears and prejudices of whites, they found new "victim" constituencies to "protect" with pledges of government largesse and favoritism.

So, blacks and perhaps Hispanics, among others, became the new and increasingly dependent beneficiaries of racial preference. Other "peoples of color," such as Indians and Asians, perceived as intent on self-reliance, generally were not among the favored. Thus, the same old game resumed, with a cynical new arrangement of pieces on the playing board. Once again, the Democrats sought gain through divisive means, playing on fear and resentment.

Then as now, opponents were attacked personally. For a Wallace supporter, it was easier to brand someone as an "agitator," or worse, than to engage in a substantive discussion about the virtues and vices of racial segregation and discrimination. Better to smear the opposition, especially when your position on the merits is weak.

Today, many Americans are unhappy that Congress has enacted, in a dramatically partisan fashion, sweeping "health care" legislation that entails unprecedented federal interference in doctor-patient relationships, an array of new and higher taxes, and unsustainable increases in government spending. Similarly unwelcome are the union sweeteners, the student loan takeover and the "expert" panels that will restrict access to medications and treatments.

Perhaps most outrageous is the (underreported) fact that our "ruling elite" have exempted themselves from the regime being imposed on the rest of us. If it's such a good thing, why do you suppose they carved themselves out of it? In sum, there are a multitude of grounds on which Americans oppose Obamacare.

In response, the Democrats revert to Jim Crow tactics: Change the subject via personal attacks. They hurl accusations of "racism," and use the vulgar sexual innuendo "tea-bagger" to assail fellow Americans who oppose the administration's aggressive expansion of federal power.

In fact, in all of the issues raised by the dissenters, there is not a trace of race. Would people be equally concerned if Hillary Rodham Clinton were in office and moving forcefully to implement the same agenda as President Obama? I think so. Or, would people march in protest if a President Colin L. Powell or Condoleezza Rice were pursuing more moderate policies? I think not.

While everyone is watching closely the recent moves by the administration with respect to offshore drilling and thinking Cap and Trade deals, Senator Chuck Schumer with the help of wolf-in-Republicans-clothing Senator Lindsey Graham are looking toward Immigration "Reform". As presented, the Schumer-Graham framework emphasizes more border security, a guest worker program, the expansion of the controversial E-Verify employment eligibility system, the introduction of a biometric Social Security card, and a “tough but fair” path to legalization for undocumented residents. Of all the things the framework hopes to do, it is the path to legalization that holds the most benefit for Democrats.

So, expect the cries of racism to increase. No doubt followed by Al Sharpton making his normal rounds.

Don't miss Arts, Eats and Beats tonight.

Join the excitement! Make your way to the Fondren district Thursday, April 8th, between 5:00 and 9:00 in the evening to welcome spring to Fondren! North State Street will be closed off between Duling Avenue and Fondren Place for our street party! Our event sponsors, Bancorp South and My Scoop will have tents in the street with surprises and goodies for all! And, be sure to stop by the Foundation tent to buy your 2010 Arts Eats & Beats limited edition t-shirt for only $10! The featured beverage this year from Southern Beverage is Budwiser’s Select 55.


And, at the Main Stage, under the canopy at Kolb’s Grand Cleaners will be our featured musicians! A plethora of artists will be at Duling School Shops with their fine works for sale. Our signature restaurants will have special offerings for this year’s event also. So much to do , so much to see, and one night only!

FCC Net Neutrality Smackdown a Win for Free Market, Limited Government

In a huge win for the free market and limited government, a federal appeals court today put a halt to the Federal Communications Commission’s attempt to exert its authority over the Internet and its power play to regulate the companies who provide access to it.

The decision, issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, centers around the FCC’s efforts to enact “net neutrality,” a policy that would prevent ISPs such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast from managing the flow of traffic on the Internet by discriminating among content and applications that put a high load on their networks.

The Foundry

Expanding health coverage busted state budgets. Will it bust the federal budget too?

Peter Suderman

The Affordable Care Act—otherwise known as ObamaCare—isn't the first attempt to expand health insurance coverage in America. Before Washington passed its law, a number of states took smaller-scale cracks at the job—each of which proved far more expensive than planned. As the nation dives further into debt, the destabilizing fiscal effects of those programs don't bode well for how ObamaCare will shape the U.S. budget.

As spectacular failures go, it's hard to do worse than Tennessee. This early state attempt to dramatically increase health coverage, dubbed TennCare, started off promisingly. In 1994, the first year of its operation, the system added half a million new individuals to its rolls. Premiums were cheap—just $2.74 per month for people right above the poverty line—and liberal policy wonks loved it. The Urban Institute, for example, gave it good marks for "improving coverage of the uninsurable or high-risk individuals with very limited access to private coverage." At its peak, the program covered 1.4 million individuals—nearly a quarter of the state's population and more than any other state's Medicaid program—leaving just 6 percent of the state's population uninsured.

But those benefits came at a high price. By 2001, the system's costs were growing faster than the state budget. The drive to increase coverage had not been matched by the drive to control costs. Vivian Riefberg, a partner at consulting firm McKinsey & Company, described it as having "almost across the board, no limits on scope and duration of coverage." Spending on drug coverage, in particular, had gone out of control: The state topped the nation in prescription drug use, and the program put no cap on how many prescription drugs a patient could receive. The result was that, by 2004, TennCare's drug benefits cost the state more than its entire higher education program. Meanwhile, in 1998, the program was opened to individuals at twice the poverty level, even if they had access to employer-provided insurance.

In other words, the program's costs were uncontrolled and unsustainable. By 2004, the budget had jumped from $2.6 billion to $6.9 billion, and it accounted for a quarter of the state's appropriations. A McKinsey report projected that the program's costs could hit $12.8 billion by 2008, consuming 36 percent of state appropriations and 91 percent of new state tax revenues. On the question of the system's fiscal sustainability, the report concluded that, even if a number of planned reforms were implemented, the program would simply "not be financially viable."

Reason

Obama says we’ll learn to love it

By Hon. Ernest Istook

President Obama is blitzing the media again, saying America will grow to love his health care agenda. He’s banking on his charm offensive because, judging from recent polls, we don’t love that agenda at all.

His message resembles the show-stopping song belted out by Effie in “Dreamgirls.” Obama is channeling those defiant and clinging lyrics, “I’m staying and you . . . you’re gonna love me!”

The defiant approach didn’t work for Effie in the movie, but Jennifer Hudson won an Oscar for her incredible performance. Obama may likewise win awards for effort, but a great performance doesn’t fix the problems with his agenda anymore than it fixed Effie’s woes.

To millions of Americans, Obama’s message reminds them more of George Orwell’s “1984,” where everyone must love Big Brother—or else.

The Daily Caller

New Department of Labor Regs to End Internships for Private Enterprise

This will also have a disproportionate impact against students who are not left-wing ideologues as most of those students intend on going into left-wing non-profit advocacy and the government anyway. It’s the independent and conservative students who just want to get the skills and connections to make an honest living in the free market who are going to get screwed.

RedState

“Barack Obama is opposed to an individual’s right to make the individual’s own decisions about what is in the individual’s own best interest.”I suggested once that Barack Obama is naive when it comes to the American free enterprise system, but let’s just scratch that. The man really is trying to dismantle it and remake it in his own image — that of a law school professor who champions “public interest” work over the business of America, which is to say business itself.

This has been happening across America in academia where professors are gladly dismantling programs that teach, for example, law students how to be corporate lawyers and work in business in favor of training up an army of public interest liberals who sue the state in the name of progress to stop progress.

Barack Obama, coming from that culture, wants the nation to do the same. The Wall Street Journal is reporting the Obama administration is banning internships within private businesses.

Ponder that — Barack Obama is destroying another aspect of the free enterprise system

Barack Obama is telling teenagers and college students, who are now suffering through a 26% unemployment rate, that they are not allowed to volunteer their time in the free market in exchange for acquiring valuable and relevant job skills that might, just might, get them off the unemployment line — and that ignores the ability to make valuable connections through networking in the workplace and build relationships for future careers and opportunities. The lost opportunity just of the loss of networking and relationship building is overwhelming and will put some college students who did not go to the right school or belong to the right fraternity or sorority or come from the right town at a serious, serious disadvantage.

Since the nation was formed and even before that, apprenticeships and then internships have been a key way for students to acquire valuable jobs skills. Companies would, frequently through college programs, agree to put a student to work teaching the student a trade. The company would get free labor and the student would, at no cost, get job skills.

Pelosi tells home crowd that American's are on a need to know basis when it comes to Health Care Reform

San Francisco television KCBS had this report on Speaker Pelosi speaking to her supporters on Tuesday during the Easter Recess. The report says she "received a standing ovation from the crowd at the Mark Hopkins Hotel, describing the passage of healthcare reform as the crowning achievement of her Congressional career."

It goes on to report that she compared HCR to "the enactment of social security, medicare and the civil rights act."

All these platitudes are to be expected. But, what is even more telling is her comments about how she wants to be your government nanny.

”It’s like the back of the refrigerator. You see all these wires and the rest,” said Pelosi. “All you need to know is, you open the door. The light goes on. You open this door, you go through a whole different path, in terms of access to quality, affordable healthcare for all Americans.”

Neo-neocon had this to say:

What an oily, condescending, manipulative, lying piece of work she is.

I don’t mean to be anti-female, but Pelosi’s suggestion strikes me as something only a woman could have come up with. I have that attitude myself to most mechanical and/or electrical gadgetry and appliances, including computers: don’t tell me how it works, just make it work.

But for a supposed servant of the people to use such a metaphor to refer to a bill that affects us all in such important ways is outrageously and offensively paternalistic (or should I say “maternalistic?”) and flies in the face of what the relationship between the citizens and Congress in this country is meant to be.

Moe Lane said:

So, you know, never you worry about the fact that the wires seem to be hooked up to a baby. Which is crying. And on fire.

How Much More Of This Silliness Will Come Out Before November?

The Democrats ability to spin the Health Insurance Reform into a positive by November was already seriously in doubt. Now comes this

CRS: Health Law May Allow Viagra Coverage for Sex Offenders

The Congressional Research Service confirmed in a memo Wednesday that rapists and sex offenders may get federally subsidized Viagra and other sexual performance enhancing drugs under the recently passed health care reform law — information that Republicans charge will haunt Democrats in upcoming elections.

“Providing child molesters with taxpayer-funded Viagra shows the folly of government-run health care. Senators who allowed this to happen will be haunted by this vote for years to come,” said John Hart, a spokesman for Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.).

Coburn, who requested the CRS review of the health care reforms, sought to add last-minute changes to the health care reconciliation bill that would prohibit sex offenders from receiving drugs such as Viagra under the health care law. However, that amendment was defeated during the Senate’s vote-a-rama.

According to the CRS, under existing rules there are no prohibitions against providing erectile dysfunction drugs to rapists, pedophiles or other types of sex offenders. The new law does “not appear to prohibit a qualified health plan in a health insurance exchange from providing coverage for drugs prescribed to treat ED for a non-incarcerated beneficiary who was previously convicted of rape, child molestation, or another sex offense” the CRS said in its memo, dated April 2 but released Wednesday. The report also said that “a convicted rapist, child molester, or other sex offender who is not incarcerated would not appear to be excluded from enrolling in a qualified health plan offered through an American Health Benefit Exchange in their state solely because of that conviction.”

Jim Manley, a spokesman for Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), accused Coburn, who made the memo public, of a disingenuous political ploy. “This is just another attempt at hype by Sen. Coburn as he goes about trying to make a mockery of the legislative process. If he has a problem, offer legislation and deal with the issue in a constructive fashion instead of issuing a press release. To be clear, his goal is to repeal a law that will provide tax credits to small businesses, protect families from insurance companies that deny coverage based on pre-existing conditions, close the doughnut hole, allow parents to keep their young adult children on their policies,” Manley said.

The Foundry: How the Left Really Plans to Pay for Obamacare

According to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), over half of President Barack Obama’s new $940 billion health care entitlement is paid for by price-fixing Medicare cuts. Never mind that the President’s own Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services says that these cuts would cause “roughly 20 percent” of Medicare providers to go bankrupt in Obamacare’s first ten years. The CBO has to believe these cuts will happen because they are required, by law, to believe everything Congress tells them. The American people are not. So the American people ought to know that instead of cutting doctors’ Medicare reimbursement rates by 21% as required by law on April 1, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services froze payments at current levels until Congress could come back after Easter recess and rescind those cuts. Again. As they have done every year but one since the cuts were first enacted in 1997.

This doc fix is big enough that, if it had been included as a cost of Obamacare, it would have sent the President’s bill into the red all by itself. But the half trillion dollars in Medicare cuts used to fund the rest of Obamacare are a much bigger problem. Even if we assume they all go as planned, President Obama’s budget would borrow 42 cents for each dollar spent in 2010; would run a $1.6 trillion deficit in 2010; and would leave permanent deficits that top $1 trillion as late as 2020. Add on the half trillion dollars in Medicare cuts that, given Congress’ track record, the American people would be naive to think will ever happen, and the federal government is looking at a pile of new debt.

The left’s solution to this problem has been simmering for some time now. Senate Budget Committee chairman Kent Conrad (D-ND) floated the idea to The Washington Post last May. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) told Charlie Rose it was “on the table” in October. And yesterday White House adviser Paul Volcker told the New York Historical Society it should be considered. The “it” here is a Value Added Tax (VAT), which is a fancy way of saying national sales tax.

A VAT can be (and has been) structured in many different ways. But the real world results are always the same: higher taxes, more government spending, lower growth, fewer jobs and more special interest power.

Higher Taxes: Don’t believe for a second that a VAT will help offset other taxes. International evidence clearly shows that a VAT is likely to increase the aggregate burden of govern­ment. Europeans used to only have a slightly higher tax burden than the United States. But beginning in the late 1960s, European countries began to implement VATs. Since then, the overall tax burden in Europe has climbed rapidly. And once a VAT is in place, the evidence shows that the tax rate rises over time.

Higher Government Spending: Not surprisingly, with more revenues, European governments turn around and spend much more than the United States does. According to a study by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, government spending grew 45 percent faster in VAT nations than in non-VAT countries.

Slower Growth: According to the academic literature, there is a strong negative relationship between govern­ment spending and economic performance. In other words, more government spending means less economic growth and fewer jobs. Economic growth is driven by individuals and entrepreneurs operating in free markets, not by Washington spending and regulations.

More Power to Washington: There is one economy that would greatly benefit from a VAT: Washington, DC. No VAT could ever be levied evenly on all goods and services. Due to political considerations, a VAT in addition to current taxes would likely exempt politically sensitive items like food, clothing, health care and housing. Industries would lobby heavily for exemptions from the VAT for the economic benefits described above. This would give Congress an even larger role in picking winners and losers in the marketplace. Success would depend less on ingenuity and hard work and more on the ability to gain political favor.

Our nation faces a financial crisis. But low revenues are not the problem. Spending is. Heritage fellow Brian Riedl explains:

Real federal spending remained steady at $21,000 per household throughout the 1980s and 1990s, before President Bush hiked it to $25,000 per household. Now, President Obama has a proposed a budget that would permanently spend a staggering $32,000 per household annually – and that’s before all the baby boomers retire and add another $10,000 per household in Social Security, Medicare, and Medicare costs to the bottom line.

So the problem is not declining revenues, but rather a spending spree unlike any in American history. If Washington insists on spending $32,000 per household, it will have to tax $32,000 per household – an unaffordable and unfair tax burden regardless what kind of tax collects it.

Rather than tax America into permanent economic stagnation, President Obama and Congress must rein in runaway federal spending. Simply bringing real federal spending back to the $21,000 per household average that prevailed in the 1980s and 1990s would balance the budget by 2012 without raising a single tax on anyone. Even returning spending to the pre-recession level of 20 percent of GDP would eliminate two-thirds of the projected 2019 budget deficit without raising taxes.

The Foundry

A list of a few of the President's violated campaign promises.

NRO's Jim Geraghty has recently compiled an impressive list of expired Obama statements. The list is essentially a set of campaign promises or pledges that Obama has violated, rather in the manner of a conventional American politician. They reveal Obama's campaign persona as something of a sham.

Keep in mind we still have just under three years to go.

Will we let the government have this too?

The Associated Press is reporting that the FCC has lost a key ruling on it's desire to begin regulating free speech on the internet. We can only hope that this is as big of a setback as the writer suggests. Youtube, Google, and any other major innovation might not be at our fingertips today were this type of regulation in place when they were dreamed up. Net Neutrality is government control. Period. The organization of the TEA Party's, the ability for small Mom and Pop Companies to make a name for themselves alongside the big players of Corporate America, the advent of the blogging writer digging for the truth and putting it out there for the world to see and debate, true and unregulated 21st century dialogue . . . with Net Neutrality it's all gone.

The ruling itself had little to do with content, and focused more on ISP companies participating in what's referred to as traffic shaping. Companies had been traffic shaping in order to penalize users who illegally download copyrighted material such as music and movies, through the use of torrent files.

However, the ruling clearly questions the FCC's authority to control ISP's "network management practices," a clear sign that the content related regulation of Net Neutrality proponents would be an uphill battle. The court’s decision states that while the FCC is permitted to make rules and issue orders to fulfill its own responsibilities, “for a variety of substantive and procedural reasons those provisions cannot support its exercise of ancillary authority over Comcast’s network management practices.”

FCC loses key ruling on Internet `neutrality'

By JOELLE TESSLER - AP Technology Writer

A federal court threw the future of Internet regulations and U.S. broadband expansion plans into doubt Tuesday with a far-reaching decision that went against the Federal Communications Commission.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that the FCC lacks authority to require broadband providers to give equal treatment to all Internet traffic flowing over their networks. That was a big victory for Comcast Corp., the nation's largest cable company, which had challenged the FCC's authority to impose such "network neutrality" obligations on broadband providers.

The unanimous ruling by the three-judge panel marks a serious setback for the FCC, which is trying to adopt official net neutrality regulations. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, a Democrat, argues such rules are needed to prevent phone and cable companies from using their control over Internet access to favor some kinds of online content and services over others.

The case centers on Comcast's actions in 2007 when it interfered with an online file-sharing service called BitTorrent, which allows users to swap big files such as movies over the Internet. But public interest groups stressed that the ramifications of Tuesday's ruling are much broader. That's because it undercuts the FCC's ability to prevent broadband providers from becoming gatekeepers for many kinds of online services, potentially including Internet phone programs and software that runs in a Web browser.

"Today's appeals court decision means there are no protections in the law for consumers' broadband services," Gigi Sohn, co-founder of Public Knowledge, said in a statement. "Companies selling Internet access are free to play favorites with content on their networks, to throttle certain applications or simply to block others."

The decision also has serious implications for the massive national broadband plan released by the FCC last month. The FCC needs clear authority to regulate broadband in order to push ahead with some its key recommendations, including a proposal to expand broadband by tapping the federal fund that subsidizes telephone service in poor and rural communities.

In a statement, the FCC said it remains "firmly committed to promoting an open Internet and to policies that will bring the enormous benefits of broadband to all Americans" and "will rest these policies ... on a solid legal foundation."

Comcast welcomed the decision, saying "our primary goal was always to clear our name and reputation."

At the heart of the court case is Comcast's challenge of a 2008 FCC order banning it from blocking subscribers from using BitTorrent. The commission, at the time headed by Republican Kevin Martin, based its order on a set of net neutrality principles adopted in 2005.

Read more of the AP Report at the Sun Herald

Net Neutrality is government regulation. It is the FCC picking and choosing what it decides is and is not in the best interest of the public. One of the biggest proponents is Al Gore. Need I say more?

The Cato Institute probably put it best when it calls Net Neutrality "A Solution In Search of A Problem.'"

This is a very good video from Reason TV that answers the question, "What the hell is Net Neutrality?"




And below is a video of Candidate Barack Obama endorsing Net Neutrality in 2007 to, as he puts it, "ensure the free and full exchange of information." Remember, he's the one that just gave us a $940 trillion dollar bill that would ensure the free and full exchange of health care for all citizens.




I ain't buying any of it. Reagan reminded us . . .

Regulating the "Rocky Mountain High"

Wonder what John Denver would think about all this? And in a town named Fruita no less!

In Colorado town, vote on sales tax for marijuana

The Associated Press

FRUITA, Colo. -- Voters in the western Colorado town of Fruita are deciding whether to make their town the first in the state to tax medical marijuana.

The City Council decided to ask voters Tuesday whether to impose a 5 percent sales tax on medical marijuana to help the town of about 11,000 cover costs of regulating dispensaries.

City Manager Clint Kinney says the town estimates the most it could possibly generate from the tax is $100,000. Only one application to open a dispensary is pending.

A voter-approved amendment to the Colorado constitution allows limited marijuana use for certain medical conditions but doesn't regulate dispensaries.

Fruita's rules include background checks for dispensary owners.

Changes coming to health insurance plans

Consumers and employers who provide health insurance are scrambling to understand what will change in their premiums and benefits once the recently passed law goes into effect.

The new legislation applies broadly to nearly all private plans. That includes policies offered by large self-insured employers, through whom about half of the nation's covered workers get their insurance.

Some new rules — such as barring insurers from rejecting children with medical conditions or from canceling policies retroactively — are aimed at problems that mainly affect the 17 million people who buy their own insurance in the so-called non-group market.

But even the approximately 175 million Americans who get group coverage through their jobs will see changes.

Employers are flooding benefit firms with questions.

"We're getting a lot of calls (asking) ... to translate what this law means," says Kelly Traw, a principal with benefits consultancy Mercer. "That's a daunting task right now."

Some specific changes to policies and benefits aren't spelled out in the law. While some changes mandated by the new law appear fairly straightforward — no lifetime caps on coverage, for example — other provisions are missing crucial details, which must be clarified by the Department of Health and Human Services in regulations.

It will be up to the HHS secretary, for example:

• To define the breadth of coverage in an "essential benefits package."

• To determine how insurers will calculate how much they spend on direct medical care, a key point because insurers who don't meet specific spending benchmarks must issue rebates to consumers.

An HHS spokesman wouldn't provide details on when regulations will be issued. But, with some provisions set to go into effect by the end of September, pressure is on to move quickly.

 

Among the unknowns is the effect on premiums in the next couple of years. New taxes on drug companies, device makers and insurers don't begin until at least 2012. But when they do, economists expect that the increases will be passed along to employers and consumers. Barring insurers from setting lifetime coverage limits may also put upward pressure on premiums.

 

Read more at Kaiser Health News

WLBT Report--Madison mayor questions county engineering fees (Video)

The verbal back and forth is ramping up between Mayor Mary and Rudy Warnock over the engineering fees. Around the one minute mark of the video is an interesting edit, as the Mayor asks why projects are engineered before construction funding is available. The video immediately cuts to Warnock saying, "it is a waste of time, and a waste of money." I'm pretty sure he wasn't commenting on the engineering fees he's been able to collect prior to funding of projects. Was the WLBT editor having a bit of fun?

Madison Mayor Mary Hawkins Butler is demanding a forensic audit of engineering projects done in her city by Madison County Engineer Rudy Warnock.

This request comes after an independent audit done on Warnock that claimed to find discrepancies in how much he was charging for his work.

The audit was done by hired engineer Richard McAfee of Florida. In his report, he claimed to have found multiple instances of excessive charges to the city of Madison, and questionable payments to the Warnock and Associates Engineering Firm.

WLBT

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